Because the `compress' utility is covered by patents (US 4,464,650 and
4,558,302), we cannot use it; it is not free software.
Instead, the GNU Project uses the `gzip' program, which is free of known
software patents and also compresses better than `compress'. Files
compressed with this method end with `.gz'.
Gzip can also uncompress files compressed with `compress' (i.e. files
ending in `.Z'), since the uncompression algorithm is not patented.
To extract sources that are in files ending in `.tar.gz' you can use the
command
gzip -d < foo.tar.gz | tar xf -
where `foo.tar.gz' is the name of the file.
Gzip is available in source form on this ftp archive, in the files
gzip-N.N.shar and gzip-N.N.tar (where N.N is the version number - e.g.
1.2.4).
The file gzip-N.N.tar.gz is also available for those who
already have gzip but want to get a newer version, since the gzipped
file will transfer faster.
Gzip is also available as a DOS executable in the file
gzip-N.N.msdos.exe. To find a VMS executable, read gzip-vms.README.